Digital spaces are interwoven into the fabric of children's and families’ lives. Part 2 of this series on digital media highlights how digital media use might shape children's and adolescents’ well-being and includes studies that illuminate the ways that digital media can introduce risks through harmful content, displacement of other healthy behaviors, or contact from unwanted adults. These studies examine how digital media intersects with social determinants of health and mental health such as online victimization, problematic internet use, and academic performance, and with physical health, such as sedentary behaviors and eating disorders. Pediatric research practices and advocacy need to advocate for child-centered design—digital media that respect children’s drive to learn and explore, but provide safe spaces, don’t coerce, and let young viewers disengage.
Pediatric Collections offers what you need to know - original, focused research in a snapshot approach.
Digital media companies are hurtling ahead in a race to capitalize on artificial intelligence (AI) technology, with commercial motives. The evolution of technology continues without enough voices from families and pediatricians to design the technology to suit children’s needs. Indeed, families are adopting technologies at an exponentially more rapid clip with each new technology developed.
Part 2 of this book series reflects on previous breakthroughs on the impact of digital media on child and adolescent outcomes, illuminating the ways that digital media can introduce risks through harmful content, displacement of other healthy behaviors, or contact from unwanted adults. This collection delves into how digital media intersects with physical health, such as sedentary behaviors and eating disorders; how digital media intersects with social determinants of health and mental health such as online victimization, problematic internet use, and academic performance. Additional risks identified in this collection explore amplification with artificial intelligence (AI), creating algorithms selecting commercialized content for children with surgical precision, creating sophisticated interactive designs to demand more and more timed play for young children, and widening the systemic and structural disparities that shape children and adolescent’s daily lives and digital experiences.
